A place to find out more about football and the girls who play it in Australia

Monday, September 28, 2009

Less than a week and counting

Yay, the second season of the Westfield W-League is almost upon us!
First of all, some notes from the weekend's Matildas camp. There was no WA girls as the ones who would have been invited, Collette McCallum and Lisa de Vanna, were on route back from America where they both played in the finals of the American WPS league (McCallum won it with her team Sky Blue FC).

Sasha McDonnell and Kara Mowbray officially don't have a club as yet, but expect them to pop up at Melbourne, Adelaide or Newcastle by this weekend. Also, not so great news for Perth who I tipped her to sign with, but Katie Gill probably won't be lobbing back in Australia until mid-November due to her playing committments in Melbourne. The striker arrived in just hours before the Jets played Canberra United in Round 1 last year (and still scored two goals to boot to hand the Jets a 2-1 win), but given the Aussie league starts earlier this year it means fans are unlikely to be able to see much of miss Gill. Which is a shame as she's brilliant to watch.

Other notes from the weekend, in the ACTAS/Canberra United game, where a combined ACT team played the Matildas, they only lost 1-0 and looked very impressive. Plus in the first half, when the Matildas failed to score, the backline included Kate McShea, Karla Reuter and Elise Kellond-Knight and in the centre midfield, Aivi Luik and Lauren Colthorpe. I bet Brisbane Roar coach Jeff Hopkins would have been very happy with that, giving half of his starting line-up a run against Canberra, which just so happens to be the round 1 grand final re-match game on ABC TV this weekend. New recruits Ellyse Perry, Emily van Egmond and the two girls from Taiwan, all settled in very well with the mix of ACT players.

But anyway, just a quick update to say girlswithgame will really get active this week, stay tuned to meet Queensland's 'American' import Aivi Luik (in inverted commas because she's a true blue Aussie) and find out what Matildas coach Tom Sermanni wants to see in Westfield W-League season two. Also on today, the league is launched in Sydney, so will have any news from there and Canberra United name its captain - or will it be captains?
Stay tuned!